Page 78 of All the Right Words
‘I’m looking for Olivia Noble?’ the man said.
Olivia raised a hand. ‘That’s me.’
He turned and saw her. ‘Oh, yes. There you are. How did I miss you? I’m Simon,’ he told her and waited for her to greet him. But Olivia stared blankly. ‘Yes?’
Simon didn’t take it much amiss. ‘We’ve met before, but perhaps you don’t recognise me. I don’t blame you. Since my husband's legal troubles began, I’ve aged quite a lot.’
Olivia’s eyes widened. ‘Simon. Jesus. Of course,’ she said. She swallowed thickly. ‘Is there something… Did you need something?’
‘Yes. I just came to tell you that Michael wanted me to pass on a message. He can’t come himself. The bracelet around his ankle has made sure of that. But he wanted this particular message delivered in person so I could tell him how it was received. He said to say that you made him a promise and you broke it. So now he can break his.’
Olivia’s eyes popped wide.
‘Nowthisis melodrama,’ Brenda said, picking up Vincent’s popcorn and munching down a mouthful.
Olivia was practically trembling. Harper had no idea what was about to happen, but she knew an undetonated bomb when she saw one.
‘Even when you wouldn’t testify for him, he understood,’ Simon said. ‘He knew you had to save face for the company. But we were served the suit this week. You promised you wouldn’t do that. You said you’d be there for him,’ Simon said quietly. He could have whispered it. It wouldn’t have mattered. He had the room. ‘And you piled on.’
‘I had to do that. It was only right,’ Olivia said nervously, her eyes flitting around the room. ‘He nearly took the whole company down.’
‘You told Michael you’d be there for him?’ Harper said. ‘Why the hell would you do that?’
‘Because they were partners in crime,’ Simon told everyone. ‘They stole it all together.’
Vincent was almost swooning with delirium. ‘What?’ he screeched. ‘You were ripping this place off together?’
Harper put a hand to her forehead in shock. ‘Are you serious?’ she asked Simon.
Simon nodded. ‘In fact, Olivia, can you settle a debate? I’ve been telling Michael thatyouturned him in so you could usurp his position. He doesn’t think you’d have gone that far. Am I right, or is he?’
The room turned to Olivia. Gina, who had been a statue since Simon’s accusation, asked in a softly devastated tone, ‘Well? Is he?’
Olivia looked around the room, her gaze coming to rest on Harper for some reason. ‘He’s oversimplifying it.’
‘Oh wow. This place is likepure drama,’ Vincent muttered to himself, but no one was looking at him. They were waiting for Olivia’s next move. Olivia decided that move was to pour all her rage onto Vincent. ‘Do youevershut the fuck up-’ she screeched before breaking off. ‘Wait, what are you doing with that phone.’
Vincent looked up from his iPhone. ‘Umm. Nothing.’
‘Tell me you didn’t tweet this,’ Olivia asked shakily.
Vincent laughed nervously. ‘Oh shit. There was that rule, wasn’t there? Or wait, does it still apply? Like, are you still the boss now?’ She didn’t answer, and he glanced back at his phone. His face lit up. ‘Oh wow. That’s a lot of retweets.’
Olivia looked a little moist in the forehead region. ‘I need some air,’ she said. She went in the direction of the lift before she realised it was pretty crowded over there. ‘I think I’ll take the stairs,’ she said and left via the fire exit. Harper listened to her footsteps gathering speed down the stairwell. Olivia was going at a serious clip. A door banged at the bottom of the stairwell, and she could be heard no more.
Simon smiled at the room. ‘Thanks for listening. I’ve got an appointment with the Crown Prosecution Service to be getting to, so I better head off.’ He got back into the elevator and hit the button, vanishing behind the closing doors.
Once Olivia and Simon had gone, it sucked the oxygen from the theatrics. Everyone looked around at one another.
‘What the hell do we do now?’ Vincent asked.
‘Well, I’m going home to see if I can figure out a way to turn this into a murder mystery,’ Brenda declared. She waited for the elevator to come back, and she hopped on happily.
‘Just go back to work, everyone,’ Gina said. ‘I’m gonna call some people and see what happens next.’
Everyone accepted that answer, and they all wandered off. However, there wasn’t a chance any of them would do any work in light of what had been learned. They were going to gossip their heads off, and fair enough. Their jobs were hanging by a thread, so it was anyone's guess if they even had work to do now.
Gina began to walk back to her office, and Harper followed her. She was still processing. She’d thought everyone had misbehaved, but she didn’t see it as anything other than a comedy of errors. Painful human error, to be sure. But only ever that.
